PRETTY GREEN - FOOTBALL'S HOMECOMING

For Australian football, the creation of the FFA Cup has reconnected the game to its heartland.

It's been a reconciliation of sorts, a celebration of a shared passion and a belated recognition that the game's heart beats strongest in the streets and suburbs where it is played far away from the bright lights of The A League.

Front row seat - Steve Horval and I with Perth Glory's Dino Djulbic after the match.

Over 3000 people packed into The Kingston Heath Soccer Complex in Melbourne's southern suburbs to watch local heroes, Bentleigh Greens S.C. take on A League leaders Perth Glory in the very first FFA Cup Semi-Final.

Sadly for the home fans, the fairytale run came to an end as an inform Glory found the moments of quality required to progress to the final.

A 3-0 result keeps Kenny Lowe's side brilliant start to the season rolling. For their opponents - a team of highly talented and committed part time pros - it brought to an end a rollicking ride through a cup competition that has caught the imagination of the football public.

Bentleigh Greens Under 14's represet!

The sight of the game's top team turning out a near full strength side in the suburbs to take on a team of carpenters,teachers, students and bricklayers for a spot in a major cup final is the stuff of dreams for every player kicking a ball in parks and paddocks across the country.

The FFA Cup has quickly become the envy other football codes.

No other game offers its true believers a shot at glory quite like this.

As professional football of every hue struggles to reconcile commerce and community, the FFA Cup has given football back to the people.

Coupled with the success of The Western Sydney Wanderers in connecting with those living in Sydney's sprawling west and their success in The Asian Champions League, football in Australia may be finally joining all the dots.

Just as importantly, by taking the game to the towns and suburbs, it has allowed the distinct character and culture of those communities to be expressed and celebrated in all their diversity.

Fence sitters..

For Australian football it has been a chance to salve the wounds that were yet to heal following the demise of the old NSL.

"New Football" promised a shinny future when it arrived in the guise of the A League a decade ago. In doing so, it turned its back on the enormous contribution to the game made by the old NSL clubs.

There's no question that at the time of its demise, the old NSL was moribund. Soccer Australia was an organisation riven with self interest and petty politics and needed to be levelled. Football needed to start again, and thankfully it did.

Sadly, this came at a cost to some of the game's best people.

The ethnic heritage of these clubs, so much a part of the strength and diversity of the Australian game, was seen as a liability. Australian football underwent a form of ethnic cleansing as it fought to rewrite the narrative of the game as an Australian experience.

It was a cruel conceit that denied some of our most important clubs their rightful place in the history of the game.

Tuesday night lights in Cheltenham.

Virtually every Socceroo team that every graced a football field owed its debt of gratitude to these football nurseries.

Whilst the A League has steadily built a bridge to an entirely new audience, Australian football has been slow to reconcile it's hunger for a successful future with its responsibility to acknowledge its past.

Ten years on, it may be finally ready to truly embrace its history.

There's a long way to go, but with the success of the FFA Cup it feels like football's coming home.